Adsense arbitrage on native? (17)

I've been seeing people driving native traffic to a site with Adsense.

It goes like this: native ad for dental implants -> sometimes there's a lander with content and sometimes not -> list of keywords like dental implants price, dental implants cost, etc -> simulated search engine results (but only ads, nothing organic).


1. Is this compliant or is it likely to result in an Adsense ban?


2. If it's compliant, how is it done? Is it done through Google Custom Search Engine or some other method? Is there a setting to only show ads?

I've seen those dental ads all over and I can't figure out if they're affiliate ads either... I know there's affiliate ads for similar stuff like hearing aids and home elevators, but the dental implants are a mystery to me. They've been everywhere lately.

I hadn't seen them directing to search results but I've seen other ads that do that. I've never figured out how those are monetized either.. unless they are other search networks trying to get new users but that doesn't make sense to me. Perhaps search networks buying remnant traffic?

But yeah, native abritragers used to primarily monetize those slideshows with adsense if I'm not mistaken, as I believe it paid the best, but lately I've seen them inserting Revcontent or Taboola widgets on the bottom instead. I figured it might be from Adsense cracking down but wasn't sure.

If you want to get into arbitrage there's a really good blog about doing it... can't remember the name but sure you could find it easy. These two dudes basically documented their journey to making profits from native arbitrage. It had lots of good stuff but since I do affiliate stuff instead of that I haven't read it in awhile.

Last time I check the rules for adsense, it basically said it's up to you how you get the traffic but they still reserve the right to TOS you whenever they see fit

There were some no-no's like sending pop or adult traffic to a page with adsense on it, but using native widgets or social media was allowed ... unless you were using some misleading tactics. Based on the info I have, they watch the quality of clicks coming through the ADs, they watch how advertisers behave (blocking or bidding more for your ad zones) and whenever their systems flag your traffic as low quality, you can get banned.

Maybe they're doing it to exchange the traffic because i think natives ain't that cheap to get a green ROI with adsense...
Adsense can ban whenever they want.



LeadCloak

I don't know anyone directly making it work, only via second-hand accounts, so don't take anything I say here too seriously.

I talked to a few people at AWA about it, namely the folks at Tonic who have their own solution or deal. If you're serious about it (eg think you can do 1k/day with it) you my want to contact them.

The consensus I got though was that it was challenging, required a team or at least some good tools to scale big, and the margins weren't great. On the other hand you could say that sort of thing about any vertical - only those at the top really know all the tricks while the rest struggle to make it work.

On Revcontent, I recall my rep saying that advertisers are segmenting out campaigns by 1 cent increments, so I'm assuming they're using something like clickferret or their own tool to move widgets between bidding groups based on performance. I think most run on Taboola & Outbrain though.

If you have the technical skills or drive to make it happen, then by all means get after it, but I think there are there are easier ways to make money on native.

Hey thedudebaides- are you talking about arbitrage or the dental offer that was referenced above?

If arb then yeah, it seems as though Livestly and 1-2 others represent the vast portion of arbitrage 'slideshows' I see, although I've seen some pretty poorly done slideshows stay up for a week at a time on some of the larger Revcontent widgets, so I imagine there's some amateurs playing in that sandbox too.

I really like the creativity side of this stuff so I think it would be fun to do, but I agree I think it would take a LOT of resources and budget to do right, just because there's so many variables to test... I've had enough trouble just trying to get listicals profitable so I think I'll wait on arb til some potential future moment

Your comment about the camps segmented by bid makes me wonder if alot of the top Revcontent players don't essentially ignore the 'topics' completely, and just create their own custom widget lists based on historical cpc/epc from prior campaigns.

I'm starting to build a decent-sized database of converting widgets/great widgets/bad widgets on Excel, but I haven't started creating custom whitelists yet, just using the topics and blacklisting the widgets I know are bad from the start basically (and doing brands separately).

Now trying to figure out the 'best practices' in that regard for Outbrain and Taboola though, which is a whole new adventure (though a more fun one since there's less bot widgets to worry about lol).

About arbitrage in general. Dental is just one arbitrage 'angle', there's also trucks, and I think lasik(don't quote me on that).

The biggest revcontent spenders are typically running RON blacklists or autoboost campaigns for singular large campaigns, and then there are a few who run many individual WL campaigns across verticals and countries that add up to consistent big spends.

The one problem with whitelists I've found is that the widgets slowly drop off or disappear over time, and it can be a lot of work building them out and getting the right bidding figured out.

I really prefer autoboost overall at this point, but you typically have to build up a good amount of conversion data in your account first.

Interesting. Much appreciate the insights.

I want to try auto-boost but I believe for my current offer I can't do it because its a Clickbank vsl and I don't have access to the offer page.

For some of my other stuff I'm working on I could probably do it though so I'll have to try that.

I've also been doing the Revcontent retargeting and I'm getting lots of clicks but surprisingly I have a lower epc and conversion rate for those than I do for regular clicks... I'm sure that's not normal so it must be an idiosyncrasy of my overall campaign or be from something I'm doing wrong, but doing it has definitely illustrated the power that retargeting has. I want to start using retargeting pixels from all 3 networks on all my offers and hopefully build up decent retargeting lists.

Again thanks for the wisdom thedudeabides!

Originally Posted by jack_l

Interesting. Much appreciate the insights.

I want to try auto-boost but I believe for my current offer I can't do it because its a Clickbank vsl and I don't have access to the offer page.

For some of my other stuff I'm working on I could probably do it though so I'll have to try that.

I've also been doing the Revcontent retargeting and I'm getting lots of clicks but surprisingly I have a lower epc and conversion rate for those than I do for regular clicks... I'm sure that's not normal so it must be an idiosyncrasy of my overall campaign or be from something I'm doing wrong, but doing it has definitely illustrated the power that retargeting has. I want to start using retargeting pixels from all 3 networks on all my offers and hopefully build up decent retargeting lists.

Again thanks for the wisdom thedudeabides!

Originally Posted by thedudeabides

You can use revcontent's postback to get around that, for when a conversion registers in your tracker. Ask your rep for the right API key to set that up, as I think it's still different from the one in your account.

BTW How did you setup conversion tracking for clickbank offers to your tracker? Custom pixel on the 'my site' settings page?

For re-targeting, are you seeing much spend relative to your main campaign with re-targeting? I only ever see very low spend, like 1-3% of campaign's daily spend in retargeting. May want to look at trying voluumDSPs retargeting pixel to give you access to more native network's inventory.

If you're running clickbank VSL, I'm assuming you're using a short pre-lander that gets high CTR?

Might be worth testing firing the retargeting pixel using javascript only for those who have clicked the link. EG fire the pixel on the main lander and open the VSL in a new tab. Should be better quality.

Something like the following should work to fire a pixel. If you don't target blank, you'll need to add additional code to wait for a response from your pixel url before proceeding to your click url.

                <a href='https://yourclickurl.com' target='_blank' onclick='firePixel();'>click me</a>


                <div id='click-tracking'></div>


                <script>
                    function firePixel() {
                        var output = document.getElementById('click-tracking');
                        output.insertAdjacentHTML('beforeend', '<iframe src="https://yourpixelurl.com/" style="width:0;height:0;border:0; border:none;"></iframe>');
                    }
                </script>

Awesome! Huge thanks hawaiimon!

Originally Posted by jack_l

Hey thedudebaides- are you talking about arbitrage or the dental offer that was referenced above?

If arb then yeah, it seems as though Livestly and 1-2 others represent the vast portion of arbitrage 'slideshows' I see, although I've seen some pretty poorly done slideshows stay up for a week at a time on some of the larger Revcontent widgets, so I imagine there's some amateurs playing in that sandbox too.

I really like the creativity side of this stuff so I think it would be fun to do, but I agree I think it would take a LOT of resources and budget to do right, just because there's so many variables to test... I've had enough trouble just trying to get listicals profitable so I think I'll wait on arb til some potential future moment

Your comment about the camps segmented by bid makes me wonder if alot of the top Revcontent players don't essentially ignore the 'topics' completely, and just create their own custom widget lists based on historical cpc/epc from prior campaigns.

I'm starting to build a decent-sized database of converting widgets/great widgets/bad widgets on Excel, but I haven't started creating custom whitelists yet, just using the topics and blacklisting the widgets I know are bad from the start basically (and doing brands separately).

Now trying to figure out the 'best practices' in that regard for Outbrain and Taboola though, which is a whole new adventure (though a more fun one since there's less bot widgets to worry about lol).

@gritaction - Yes, from the very start on Revcontent I recorded every single widget that converted and every single one that I blocked. I think this was absolutely integral to any success I've had on the platform.

Bad widgets on Revcontent can suck 200$ out of your campaign in 20 minutes if you're blacklisting with a medium or high bid, so its crucial to develop a 'permanent blacklist' that you apply to every blacklist or 'run of network' campaign.

Likewise, some of the best widgets are medium-sized sites you only find while running blacklist (run of network) campaigns, and are not available as 'Brands' to target directly, so by cataloguing them you build up a nice group of widgets you can pick and choose from for your campaigns.

At this point I don't run Run Of Network campaigns at all unless I have a super profitable offer with low cpc's I want to 'go exploring' with. Instead, when I'm starting a new offer or new idea, I just pick and choose 20-100 widgets I think match the demographic profile of the offer best, and use them as a whitelist to test it.

Some widgets might be great for one kind of offer but horrible for another, so it really depends on what campaign you are running whether you would want to include something in your whitelist.

It's also integral you have a tracker that picks up the referring website name of each click. Its really hard to optimize (in my opinion) based only on widget ID's. You need to also know the name of the website (or at least that makes it much easier I think).

I use Thrive so I just sort my Target>Widget ID>Referrer and go through the data and any converting widget or really bad widget gets added to my 'database' in excel, and added to my 'Permanent Blacklist' on TheOptimizer.io.

I don't do that with Outbrain or Taboola really though, since you can't create whitelists on them (or at least I can't) and since such a large percentage of your traffic comes from a few really big sites like MSN. On Revcontent though its mostly medium-sized sites and you can create whitelist campaigns, so I think its more important there. Plus because of the aforementioned bad widgets that will 'attack' you if they aren't already blocked.

Hope that helps - I should add that this is all conjecture and personal experience only on my part- I am far from a Revcontent expert and every day I make it through without getting utterly crushed is one I'm thankful for- media buying/performance marketing is a VERY humbling endeavor. And- obviously- there are many ways to do things and I'm sure other people have strategies that are far more effective than mine.

Originally Posted by jack_l

@gritaction - Yes, from the very start on Revcontent I recorded every single widget that converted and every single one that I blocked. I think this was absolutely integral to any success I've had on the platform.

Bad widgets on Revcontent can suck 200$ out of your campaign in 20 minutes if you're blacklisting with a medium or high bid, so its crucial to develop a 'permanent blacklist' that you apply to every blacklist or 'run of network' campaign.

Likewise, some of the best widgets are medium-sized sites you only find while running blacklist (run of network) campaigns, and are not available as 'Brands' to target directly, so by cataloguing them you build up a nice group of widgets you can pick and choose from for your campaigns.

At this point I don't run Run Of Network campaigns at all unless I have a super profitable offer with low cpc's I want to 'go exploring' with. Instead, when I'm starting a new offer or new idea, I just pick and choose 20-100 widgets I think match the demographic profile of the offer best, and use them as a whitelist to test it.

Some widgets might be great for one kind of offer but horrible for another, so it really depends on what campaign you are running whether you would want to include something in your whitelist.

It's also integral you have a tracker that picks up the referring website name of each click. Its really hard to optimize (in my opinion) based only on widget ID's. You need to also know the name of the website (or at least that makes it much easier I think).

I use Thrive so I just sort my Target>Widget ID>Referrer and go through the data and any converting widget or really bad widget gets added to my 'database' in excel, and added to my 'Permanent Blacklist' on TheOptimizer.io.

I don't do that with Outbrain or Taboola really though, since you can't create whitelists on them (or at least I can't) and since such a large percentage of your traffic comes from a few really big sites like MSN. On Revcontent though its mostly medium-sized sites and you can create whitelist campaigns, so I think its more important there. Plus because of the aforementioned bad widgets that will 'attack' you if they aren't already blocked.

Hope that helps - I should add that this is all conjecture and personal experience only on my part- I am far from a Revcontent expert and every day I make it through without getting utterly crushed is one I'm thankful for- media buying/performance marketing is a VERY humbling endeavor. And- obviously- there are many ways to do things and I'm sure other people have strategies that are far more effective than mine.

Originally Posted by gritaction

thank you very much again Jack. i salute again to your generous, helping attitude and kindness.
I ran a few camapign in revcontent and is all red :/
i think the biggest mistake i had is running it with a low budget which we have tackled this in other thread.
i wonder if revcontent have soooo many medium sized website with bad bot, is it better to run native on Outbrain and Taboola so that a newbie like me do not need to worry about the need to blow a large budget before i can acquire a whole chuck of permanent blacklist or whitelist widget? eventhough the cost will be higher.

Originally Posted by jack_l

That's an interesting question and one I've pondered before...

Certainly one advantage of Taboola and Outbrain is that you don't really have bot widget 'attacks' like you do on Revcontent (and MGID to some extent). You do see bad widgets that go 0 for 40 and that sort of thing but its rarer and doesn't happen instantly. Also most of your clicks always seem to come from MSN, which is excellent traffic. And you can set a much lower budget per day - as low as 20$, and you don't need to worry about overspend as much as on Revcontent.

The other side of the coin though is that Outbrain and Taboola are much stricter about what they'll allow. They want the landing pages quite 'tight' and expect the language used to be much less hyperbolic/salesy. I've heard of a few 'newbies' who try 20+ campaigns on Taboola and Outbrain without a single one getting approved.

And, Outbrain and Taboola are much stricter about what offers they allow- so if you're just starting out it can be hard to find offers to run on them.

Revcontent is great because they are super-affiliate friendly, and you can run lots of Clickbank, VSL-type offers on it, which are much easier to access as a new affiliate.

Most of the successful affiliate offers on Outbrain/Taboola are high-quality ecom stuff from GiddyUp, lead-gen like mortgage or solar or insurance, and stuff of that nature.

So yeah, pluses and minuses on both sides

Nothing wrong at all with trying out all three networks and seeing which one works best for you Certain people like certain networks- its a personality thing to a big extent.

And you can also just stick to brands and whitelists on Revcontent and stay away from blacklisting/run of network campaigns and have an experience somewhat more similar to Outbrain/Taboola.

Lots of possibilities that is for sure